More Warlands

5x4 table with a central highway and plenty of wilderness

So we kicked it into high gear again this week with some more of Aberrant's Warlands. Andy and I got a taste of it last week, and this time we added three more vehicles and a third player, Chris P. We're still using the vehicle stats from the starter rules, and the battlefield? (I don't know what to call it in Warlands) had the strewn debris of wrecked cars as added obstacles. We were going to count these as AM5 wrecks in terms of smashing into (and through) them. I used the leftover pieces from my car bits box.


Andy's Antagonizers

Andy was chided about being the only player to show up with unpainted minis, haha. He was using all the Warlands box set resin vehicles; two dune buggies and a utility truck. After the game we were looking at the truck and we're pretty sure it was computer drafted first, then modeled from the 3D model. A note to scale, the truck is large, quite beefy even for a "dualie", but the dune buggies on the other hand are spot on considering you are also using 1:64th scale cars...which we were.


Chris P.'s Pillagers

Chris went with the store bought Matchbox and Hot Wheels combo. These Matchbox dune buggies can't be beat in price for .99 cents, and they'll look excellent once banged up and painted. The Hot Wheels Baja race truck is great too, and it's also a buck. Any car along the lines of off road racers will be better suited for conversion work. They'll already come roll cage equipped and usually have spare gear or tires on the back.


Mik's Marauders

I had the biggest departure in terms of proxying. I used my Hot Wheels dune buggy (center) slightly painted and weathered as, well, a dune buggy. The Hot Wheels Volkswagon on the far right has a lot more conversion work done to it, and it's also proxying as a dune buggy. On the left is one of my oldest, a 1974 Hot Wheels Redline Van. It was acting as my truck, and thinking back on it, it's kind of neat that I am using a toy car that I've owned for over thirty years in a war game.


Sandwiched between enemy buggies

The rules were even easier to get to grips with this time around, and we got stuck in the action fairly quick (those dune buggies can haul). In a three player game it's always interesting to see how the sides will play out, will someone get ganged up on? It was a fairly even mix in our game, but it did seem that I got flanked by two opponents pretty fast. We're going to make some new speed counters too. Looking back at these pics, they seem static, and without knowing exactly what's going on in-game you don't really know who's coming or going. To spare me another hour or so in Photoshop, we'll whip up these new speed counters and they should hopefully fix this.


She'll be coming 'round the refinery when she comes...

Chris' truck is swinging through a turn with Andy's buggy hot on his heels. Being a little more familiar with the rules this time around we found that we were more daring wiht the turns and maneuvering. This also meant several times we had cars swerve out of control, but no one flipped or anything exciting. At one point my Redline van almost plowed off the table's edge, but I performed an emergency brake maneuver and stopped in the nick of time.


Flame on!

This game saw an insane amount of ramming, but more on that later. Here, one of Chris' buggies T-bones one of Andy's buggies, which then promptly caught fire (and exploded the following turn). You may be asking yourself (How do I work this?), err, "Where did he get those cool Litko fire counters?". Well, they're not Litko, but LEGO! If you couldn't tell from the tabletop, our highways are also LEGO. Since the game was kind of thrown together at the last minute, we just used what was on hand. I thought the fire 'tokens' worked rather well though! They're standard LEGO fire pieces.


Missiles away

My buggy missed Andy's truck with the missile launcher, but got lucky with the deviation and caught him in the blast. Since less than half of his truck was covered, he only took half damage. A word on missile launchers; I'm thinking they should have a 360° degree firing arc, instead of the 180° that they have now. I imagine a guy strapped to the roll cage, but with a shoulder mounted rocket launcher, he ought to have larger firing arc.

Unless a host of new game mechanics are introduced in the full rules, they might want to change the name to Crash Up Derby Lands, because it all comes down to ramming one another, setting up the ram, and trying to avoid the ram. About halfway through the game we realized we had been forgetting to do initiative right, which did make a difference in the ram game in the second half of the game. You start with the fastest car, in initiative order, and work your way down from there.

There were more than a few backwards rams too. Since we had three players worth of cars on the table, it came down to a quagmire in the middle. After a ram you are stationary, so often there'd be a target behind you, so you could hit reverse and perform the SLOW RAM (take it easy!) sure, it's only a dice or two of damage, but it's still fun.

Lastly on ramming, your cars will always come to a dead stand still. You can fudge the rules a little and take your shots after the ram occurs. Since you can shoot at any time before, after, or during your move, you may as well wait until the smoke clears. In the previous game, Andy and I were stopping about an inch before impact, unloading all weapons at that point, then continuing with the ram. Well consider you are about to shoot a fast moving target. Due to its speed, your target number will be very high in order to hit it. A stationary target is a cinch to hit with ranged weapons however, and since both vehicles go to stationary after a collision, well, save your ammo 'til then. Also, don't forget that bonus assault damage die for being so close.

All in all, we had a blast yet again. We are using the starter rules, so they're not jaw dropping at this point, but we threw together a good sized game, with multiple players in no time and had a fun couple of hours while at it. Some things I'd like to see addressed in the complete rules (or what would clinch it for me) would be ala carte custom car building. If I have a points menu to build my own custom cars off of, I will be MEGA happy. In the spirit of Car Wars, I'd like to see more than just weapons and armor on the menu too, give me minelayers, nitro boosters, radar jammers, and the like, even the ejection seat would be cool. I like the idea of having pre-statted vehicles, sure, but I also want the freedom to make my own.

A few times in the rule sit mentions pedestrians and walkers. It will be interesting to see how they introduce bipedal mecha into the game, and that will be cool if done right. I also want to see how foot troops will work, that could really set Warlands apart from the other car games out there. Plus, I want motorcycles, but I'm sure those are coming. The price point of this game to get into is about the cheapest you can get too, after the rules of course, and it shows a lot of promise.


Some bags full of goodies

Stan Johansen Miniatures offers a great line of 20mm "Road Warrior" products, which work beautifully with Warlands. Shown above are some accessory packs Andy picked up for me back at Historicon a couple of years back, so a belated thanks go out to him. The parts are great and include stowage, fuel cans, fuel drums, and a host of manned and automatic turret systems, with or without armor plating. Also included are some figures, many are in seated or standing positions for manning some of the turrets. They're small, as you might imagine for true 20mm, but still have nice extras like scalp trophies attached to the tops of their helmets.


The Cooper that set the land jump record

It's tough to see in this pic, but it shows a Stan Johansen fig in the passenger seat, and as you can see, it fits really well. In a game of Axles and Alloys a couple of years back, this little car set a ridiculous airborne leap record, which I'll try to dig up photos on.

Road Warriors II: Warlands

Red-lining for Guzzoline!

Hot on the heels of Andy picking up Warlands in the mail, we did a quick couple of games to try out the rules. They did not disappoint, the rules were easy to pick up and get going with, and I had zero experience with them going into it. The games played fast too, we were able to squeeze in two games easily enough in one evening.

It's best described as a skirmish style game with your units being light vehicles. The mini rulebook came with stats for both a pickup truck and a dune buggy. Your vehicles are crewed by figures that also have stats. If you've got a dune buggy, it might have a driver and a gunner, the latter of which is usually hanging on the back of the buggy with a roll cage mounted weapon such as a missile launcher or 'spud' gun. In the case of the truck, you can carry up to four passengers in the bed, in addition to the driver and crew up front. These four can all have small arms too, so you've got a mobile fire platform.

Different cars react differently on various surfaces and terrain too. Dune buggies, not surprisingly, move just fine on sand, but pickup trucks immediately lose a speed band.

The increments are measured in inches, and each vehicle has a speed band they operate in. You can accelerate one band at a time, and have to move the minimum (to maximum) in that range. Weapons are ranged too, and include different damage and rate of fire numbers. Movement on the table is handled with a 45° turn template. How many total turns you can perform during your phase is determined by your vehicle type and speed. The speed your vehicle is traveling also determines how difficult it is to be targeted.


The vehicles of the Warlands starter

The Warlands starter comes with three resin vehicles, seen above. You get two dune buggies and a pickup truck. The resin models are nicely detailed, showing details like shock absorbers and all the little nuts and bolts. The undercarriages are detailed as well, which look nice when leaving wrecks strewn across the table. They are a 'beefy' 1:64 scale, very comparable to Hot Wheels, which presents a bit of a question...do you need official Warlands models? Also to note, the Warlands starter box only comes with enough vehicles to field one side of the conflict. As you can see from that link, all the starters are sold out already too.


We have worm sign!

Shown above are three dune buggies. On the far left we have a brand new Matchbox brand dune buggy bought the day of the battle for .99 cents. In the middle is the Warlands resin buggy, weighing in at a hefty five bucks, and on the far right is a 1982 Hot Wheels buggy I painted and modified, you can still find that same model in production nowadays, and it retails for about a buck. The Warlands vehicles are nice, but do you want to pay five bucks for a single resin buggy when you can get five die-cast metal ones for the same price?

As you can see, they're comparable enough to where it doesn't really matter, especially after they've been painted. The Warlands truck comes sculpted with all the post-apoc extras you might wish for, like armored windows, and railroad track bumper ram, and the like. You could customize these extras yourself and save some money (but not the effort), or just buy the Warlands one and all you have to do is paint it. The Warlands vehicles cost more, but you're paying extra for not having to modify them yourself. I for one enjoy the challenge and flexibility of making my own however, and the price is more to my liking with the die-cast stuff.

Hot Wheels cars tend towards the zany at times, and finding more mundane "realistic" cars can sometimes be a challenge. They're very well made though, and can take quite a beating when it comes to modifying them. Matchbox cars on the other hand have many more realistic builds, and if you want a specific car, like a police SUV, or a classic Volkswagon Beetle, chances are they've got it. Matchbox cars are equally tough too.




Why not? Since we were taking pictures of the battle, we went ahead and shot a couple of movie clips too. Here, I am taking my dune buggy off the highway, through the desert, around a fuel refinery to engage Andy's vehicles that were racing up the paved highway. I've got a gunner on the back of the buggy armed with a missile launcher, who tries to shoot right before we ram our target. Also, it shows how the turn template and movement works, for this phase my buggy's moving at "fast" speed, which is a minimum of 13" and a max of 16".


Maximum mayhem

One thing about the game is that the carnage factor is high. Also, the weapons have a relatively low rate of fire, and an equally short range. In some cases, vehicles are moving farther in one turn than a weapon can shoot, so unless everyone gets 'stuck in' right on top of each other, you're not going to have a whole lot of chances at shooting each other. Since you're stuck in anyway, you might as well ram the enemy (my philosophy) and that's a proposition that's dangerous for both the rammer, and the rammie.

There is a neat attack form called an assault move, which can only be made when you're within 2" of the target though, which encourages this close quarters type of battle though. Thinking back to the Road Warrior movies though, they were always close up in battle, so it makes sense. There's a host of other moves as well to perform with your vehicle besides ramming, such as the 'nudge', and the like. There's enough variety to you plenty of options during game play.


Action movie moment


Games are played out on a 4x4 table



In this clip, Andy's truck barrels towards my dune buggy with the intent of t-boning it. Just before impact, his shotgun-wielding passenger shoots at it. Here's also a good example of the "exploding" die mechanic in the game.


Here's another example of the exploding dice mechanic. For every '6' you roll, you keep it and add another die to the accumulative total. As long as you keep rolling sixes, your number keeps getting higher. Here, my buggy went out of control, couldn't make its control check, and slammed face first into a building taking 4d6 damage. Well, after the smoke cleared, it had actually taken 8d6 damage once of few of the rolls 'exploded'.


Boom!

Keep plenty of smoke and fire counters on hand, you're going to need them. You keep track of the cars' speeds each turn by chits next to them showing their speed. We saw many vehicles take damage though during the game, but not be destroyed completely, so it's a good idea to be able to mark them to remind you which ones are smoking, on fire, out of ammo, and the like. Simple card counters are fine, or you can use more visually appealing ones like Andy's counters here. They are made from cotton balls, shaped and formed using white glue. They are glued down to metal washers, then painted to look like fire and smoke. It's an easy to do effect that looks great on the tabletop when finished.

Overall, the game was fun. We had a good time, and although we didn't know the rules beforehand, it was really easy to pick up, and they were intuitive enough to play and learn on the go. This was obviously more like a demo box than a true starter kit, what I hope will make the game shine has yet to come out. We only had the two vehicle templates, so here's to hoping they make a ton; dozens would be nice. It would also be nice to pick and choose your arms and armor piecemeal, making your own custom cars along the way, and don't stop at weapons either. You could pick engine upgrades and the like. Now I don't know if this stuff will be in the game, but it'd be nice if it were. It looks like a quality game so far, so who know?

What will really make the game stand out will be the involvement of human elements on the board, not just drivers and passengers, but infantry. By fleshing out this part of the game, you could make for some interesting scenarios and games. Plus, one person armed with a shotgun might not be much of a threat, but they should still feel useful regardless.

I will definitely play it again, but I hope the more thorough rules yet to come out will add many more layers to it. As it stands, I can see it as a game to go to on the shelf every now and then, but so far it hasn't made it into the regular rotation. As long as I can keep home brewing my own cars though, I'll always look here first.

Road Warriors

I haven't had the funds to pick up Aberrant Game's new Road Warrior inspired game, Warlands, but that's the great thing about having gaming buddies! Andy, of Little Lead Heroes, picked up a pre-order copy, he's got a writeup of it over there to check out too. Anyway, I guess I'm going to need to dust off my collection of kit-bashed Hot Wheels cars!


My one claim to fame. I won the 2006 Skunkyard Challenge, which was a "car wars" design contest online as part of the Autodueling I-64 Yahoo Group. I'm fairly proud of it.

A couple of years back I was into converting Hot Wheels scale cars over for Road Warrior genre games. Sure, everyone's heard of Car Wars, it's a classic, but not quite the same feel. We played Road Rage V8 a little bit, and Axles and Alloys more often. A lot of fun, but the rules always lacked a little something I can't put my finger on. They just lacked the longevity, but for 'con' style games at least, you really can't go wrong. Hopefully the new addition of Warlands will be the shot-in-the-arm to this oft neglected gaming genre.

Below I present not quite a dozen of my cars. Sadly, they're all that's finished, and since we didn't do a whole lot of gaming in this genre, I never really felt compelled to finish any more. I do have a box full of parts and incomplete cars though, maybe they'll be seeing the light of day in the near future. Just to add, these things are a blast to make too. Click to enlarge, enjoy...














I leave you with the pinnacle, the last of the V8 Interceptors.